Thursday, May 31, 2012

Constant companions in their youth, Manasseh, son of
King Hezekiah, and Joshua, son of the palace administrator, have been primed for
leadership of Judah.But anger toward
God begins to smolder in Manasseh’s heart upon his father’s unexpected
death.As Manasseh comes to power, his
insecurity leads him down the path of sorcery.Fearing a conspiracy, he lashes out at the leaders of his father’s
regime.

As the mayhem of Manasseh’s reign begins to unfold,
Joshua and his family suffer devastating loss.The battle lines are drawn as Joshua seeks revenge against his boyhood
friend.And with the future of god’s
faithful remnant at stake, Joshua struggles with whether to run from Yahweh…or
to Him.

My Review:

Another wonderfully written novel by the very talented
Lynn Austin.The Chronicles of the Kings
series has been a magnificent read.I’m
about to begin Book #5 which is the last in the series titled: Among the Gods.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Chronicles of the Kings – Book #3 has rewarded
Hezekiah’s faithfulness with great wealth and power, but the godly king has no
heir.In desperation, his beloved wife
takes forbidden measures to ensure fertility.With all that is going on in his kingdom – and with the Assyrians
approaching – Hezekiah does not discover his wife’s idolatry until it’s almost
too late.betrayal cuts to the very core of his being
and belief in God.Will his faith
sustain him in the face of this deceit, and against an overwhelming enemy?

My Review:

King Hezekiah and his wife, Hephzibah, were very much
in love but she remained barren.Unable
to provide her husband, the king, with an heir she turns to worshipping the
fertility goddess which is strictly against Hezekiah’s rule.This king only worships one God – Yahweh.When the king discovers Hephzibah’s
blasphemous behaviour he divorces her and banishes her to a life alone.

Coping with his insurmountable grief over the loss of
his beautiful wife, King Hezekiah listens to the wrong advice and becomes
embroiled in what he thinks is “making allies” with other kingdoms.He soon finds out that this was a huge
mistake!This fast-paced and action
packed book will keep you turning the pages until you’ve turned the very last
one!Onto Book #4.

In 2006, Vancouver’s Nazanin Afshin-Jam was on top of
the world.A year earlier, she had won
runner-up at Miss World, the first time an Iranian-born woman had ever finished
so high in the competition.She had
signed her first record deal and was a sought-after fashion model.But one rainy afternoon, Nazanin received an
email that would change her life.Please
help!Please save her!

Thousands of miles away in Tehran, the subject of that
email: a poverty stricken seventeen-year-old Kurdish-Iranian named Nazanin
Fatehi was preparing for her execution, punishment for an act that was, in her
mind, not a crime: she had stabbed a man who had tried to rape her.Afshin-Jam quickly came to Fatehi’s defence,
striding into the world of the United Nations and international diplomacy,
attempting to force Iran to reopen Fatehi’s case and stay the execution.

The Tale of
Two Nazanins weaves the inspiring real-life stories of two women,
their sisterly bond and their fight for justice that, for the first time since
the 1979 revolution, brought the Iranian regime to its knees, if only for a
brief moment.

My Review:

It is not very often that I don’t actually write a
review of my own but this is one of those times.This was the most startlingly, eye-opening,
heart-crushing piece of non-fiction I’ve read in a while.I think the description above tells, in
fairly good detail, what this story is about.I recommend that everyone read it you’ll be appalled at the number of
executions of “teenagers” and the brutality that they suffer at the hands of
their captors.It’s unimaginable!

Sunday, May 27, 2012

Ingrid Betancourt tells the story of her captivity in
the Colombian jungle, sharing powerful teachings of resilience, resistance, and
faith.Born in Bogota, raised in France,
Ingrid Betancourt at the age of thirty-two gave up a life of comfort and safety
to return to Colombia to become a political leader in a country that was being
slowly destroyed by terrorism, violence, fear, and a pervasive sense of
hopelessness.In 2002, while campaigning
as a candidate in the Colombian presidential election, she was abducted by the
FARC.Nothing could have prepared her
for what came next.She would spend the
next six and half years in the depth of the jungle as a prisoner of the
FARC.Even Silence Has an End is her deeply personal and moving account
of that time.Chained day and night for
much of her captivity, she never stopped dreaming of escape and in fact,
succeeded in getting away several times, always to be recaptured in her most
successful effort she and a fellow captive survived a week away, but were
caught when her companion became desperately ill; she learned later they had
been mere miles from freedom.

The facts of her story are astounding but it is
Betancourt’s indomitable spirit that drives this very special account, bringing
life, nuance, and profundity to the narrative.Attending as intimately to the landscape of her mind as she does to the
events of her capture and captivity, Even
Silence Has an End is a meditation on the very stuff of life-fear and
freedom, hope and what inspires it.Betancourt tracks her metamorphosis, sharing how in the routines she
established for herself-listening to her mother and two children broadcast to
her over the radio, daily prayer-she was able to do the unthinkable: to move
through the pain of the moment and find a place of serenity.

Freed in 2008 by the Colombian army, today Betancourt
is determined to draw attention to the plight of hostages and victims of
terrorism throughout the world and it is that passion that motivates Even Silence Has an End.The lessons she offers here-in courage,
resilience, and humanity-are gifts to treasure.

My Review:

What a powerful and heart-wrenching story this
was!Ingrid Betancourt is a true
survivor who lived through the worst nightmare anyone could imagine.After being abducted by a terrorist group
called FARC, Ingrid suffered immeasurable abuse, the harshest of conditions,
disease, insect bites, and illness deep in the Colombian jungle.For six and half years she was a puppet,
manipulated and mistreated, often starving for food and drink, being forced to
use bathroom conditions that were sub-human, sleeping quarters that often left
her laying soaking in the rain with a chain around neck and attached at the
other end to a tree to prevent escape.Miraculously, she did manage to escape on several different occasions
only to be caught and dragged back to the camp and re-chained.Her last escape netted her an entire week of
freedom with a fellow prisoner but she also received the harshest treatment
after that final escape attempt.

I was completely mesmerized by the story and the
faith, stamina, and resilience Ingrid showed in the face of such dire
adversity.An immensely strong and brave
woman, Ingrid often fought her jailers and spoke up for kind treatment of her
fellow prisoners, often earning herself even crueller treatment.

This is one book that I think everyone should
read.You can’t even begin to imagine
what it would be like to live under the conditions Ingrid did for as long as
she did.Just the mental exhaustion and
anxiety alone would have been enough to do me in.I certainly hope and pray that Ingrid has
healed well and has had a smooth transition back intoher family and with her children after enduring what she did for
six and a half years.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Spirited and intelligent Morayo grows up surrounded by
school friends and family in busy modern-day Ibadan, Nigeria.An adoring little sister, their traditional
parents, and a host of aunties and cousins make Morayo’s home their own.So there’s nothing unusual about her charming
but troubled cousin Bros T moving in with the family.At first Morayo and her sister are delighted
but in her innocence, nothing prepares Morayo for the shameful secret Bros T
forces upon her.

Thrust into a web of oppressive silence woven by the
adults around her, Morayo must learn to fiercely protect herself and her sister
from a legacy of silence many women in Morayo’s family share.Only Aunty Morenike – once shielded by her
own mother – provides Morayo with a safe home and a sense of female community
that sustains her as she grows into a young woman in bustling, politically
charged often violent Nigeria.

My Review:

Morayo was 5-years-old when her baby ‘albino’ sister,
Eniayo was born.She was shocked to see
that her baby sister was white with pink eyes and she was afraid to hold her
for the first time but did so out of respect.This was the very first day that the word “afin” exploded into her
world, meaning ‘albino’ and believed to bring bad luck to her entire
family.Following Yoruba tradition,
Eniayo’s naming ceremony was held eight days after her birth.That’s when the neighbours began talking: “Where
do you think this ‘afin’ child come from?”Another neighbour had said: “I just know that this is not a good thing…these
‘afin’ children, all they do is bring bad luck.”A few days later, Morayo’s father’s great-grand
Aunt, Iya Agba, the oldest person in her father’s family came to see the baby
and she was absolutely livid the child was a ‘afin’!She blamed Morayo’s mother saying she caused
the child to be born an albino by walking in the hot sun at noontime during her
pregnancy thereby giving “mischievous evil spirits the opportunity to occupy
her human body.”Morayo’s mother hung
her head in total shame with tears streaming down her face while great-aunt Iya
screamed: “Your disobedience has brought bad luck to this poor child and to our
entire family!”To show her great and
continued displeasure with Morayo’s mother, she refused to eat the special meal
that had been prepared for her, and refused to sleep in their home that night
and demanding to be taken to another relatives house.Morayo was upset that her mother was so sad
and crying, that great aunt had yelled at her and refused her food and told herself
it was all baby Eniayo’s fault.Her
family had been happy and full of laughter until “she” came along, and now itwas full of tears, shouting, and sadness.In the first few weeks Morayo refused to even go near Eniayo constantly
amking up escuses as to why she couldn’t help with her or hold her.Besides, Aunty Adunni had come to stay for a while
to help out, she was one of her mother’s relatives.However, Morayo’s mother finally caught up to
her one day and asked her: “What is chasing you?”She confessed that she was afraid of Eniayo,
a “spirit child” and what great-aunt Iya Agba had said.”Her mother put her arm around her and told
her: “…your sister is not a spirit child.She is ‘afin’ due to some things the doctors call recessive genes.”She continued on for a few more minutes explaining
more of what the doctors had said.Morayo didn’t understand most of it, but was overjoyed to know she didn’t
have to sleep at night with one eye open anymore and that she had nothing to be
ashamed about over her little sister.Finally, as the days and months passed, she no longer noticed her sister’s
pale pink eyes and instead only saw an “annoying little girl, calling my name
and determined to follow me everywhere I went.”Eventually, as the years passed, Eniayo’s features, yellowish hair, pink
eyes, and milky white skin became as familiar and welcome to Morayo as the sun
in the sky.

Morayo is now ten-years-old and Eniayo almost
five.They live in Ibadan, Nigeria in a
block of six flats along the busy Poly-Sango Road.The flat has three bedrooms on the second
floor of an old building with bold red letters painted above the front door
telling visitors they were entering Remilekun House.Remilekum was Baba Landlord’s late
mother.Morayo and Eniayo shared a bedroom
and woke each morning to the minibus driver calling out their next destinations
which for them was their alarm clock.Lucky
for them Lake Eleyele was right across the road.

After school each day the girls roamed the streets
together with their friends.Their
father was a pharmaceutical salesman who often travelled and their mother had
her tailor shop at the Amunigun Market and didn’t come home until late in the
evening.Aunty Adunni stayed home with
the girls and was always busy dong household chores.

In February of 1984, the family moved out of their
3-bedroom flat into a new two-storey house on Eleyele Road, which was just
minutes from their old neighbourhood.The rooms were bigger and the louvres on the windows opened completely
inside their black, burglar-proof metal casing.Their father had begun building the house shortly after Eniayo was born
and was proud it was finally complete as they now had something to show for all
the years of hard work.Morayo liked the
new house because she and her sister now had their own bedrooms.Eniayo didn’t like sleeping alone, so she
still went to Morayo’s room at night.

Eniayo turned seven-years-old three months after they
moved into the new house.Their second
cousin, Aunty Morenike and her three-year-old son, Damilare came to visit.Eniayo was so excited to see them and
Damilare blurted out that his Mommy had made her a birthday cake.

The following morning, Aunty Tope showed up for a
visit too and they hadn’t seen her in two years.It was sad though as she didn’t have her son,
Bros T (Tayo) with her.Later Morayo went
to find her mother and realized she was in her bedroom with her sister, Aunty
Tope.She was just about to knock on the
door when she heard someone crying and it was Aunty Tope.She heard Aunty Tope say: “Tayo has finished
me, imagine the audacity to slap your own principal!And this past holiday, he and his friend, Abu
stole a suitcase full of foreign currency from Abu’s father.That boy almost slept in prison.I have nowhere else to turn, I cannot send
him to live with his father’s people and this kind of behaviour, what would
they think of me?I want him to finish
his education here and he needs to go to university but he needs the firm hand
of a man to guide him.”Morayo knew that
Aunty Tope’s husband had died so Tayo no longer had a father.Suddenly Morayo realized footsteps were
coming toward her so she fled to her bedroom.Now that she was twelve she understood well what was going on.

It took Morayo’s mother three months to finally cave
to her demand to have Bros T move from Jos to Ibadan to live with them.The following week the now six foot Bros T
swaggered into their home with a cocky smile.The family’s troubles would soon begin and Morayo would pay a high price
for the rest of her life.The only
stability and real sense of a family closeness she would have would be Aunty
Morenike.

Daughters Who
Walk This Path is a phenomenal story and one which I didn’t want to
see end.I hope Ms. Kilanko will
consider writing a sequel to it someday.If you want an intense, can’t-take-your-eyes-off-the-page read, then
this is the book for you.I’m keeping it
as part of my permanent collection.Excellent, excellent novel.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

The debut novel from the PEN/Faulkner Award Winning
Author of The Buddha in the Attic

On a sunny day in Berkeley, California, in 1942, a
woman sees a sign in a post office window, returns to her home, and
matter-of-factly begins to pack her family’s possessions.Like thousands of other Japanese-Americans
they have been reclassified, virtually overnight, as enemy aliens and are about
to be uprooted from their homes and sent to a dusty internment camp in the Utah
desert.

In this lean and devastatingly evocative first novel,
Julie Otsuka tells their story from five flawlessly realized points of view and
conveys the exact emotional texture of their experience: the thick-walled
barracks and barbed-wire fences, the omnipresent fear and loneliness, the
unheralded feats of heroism.When the Emperor Was Divine is a work of
enormous power that makes a shameful episode of our history as immediate as
today’s headlines.

My Review:

Overnight signs appeared on trees, billboards, bus
stop benches, and store windows in Berkeley, California, in 1942 ordering
Japanese Americans to a dusty internment camp in the Utah desert.They had been “reclassified” as enemy
aliens.This novel follows one family’s
story; Mom, Dad, and two young children, a girl and a boy.

The father had been taken a few months prior by the
FBI in the middle of the night in his bathrobe and slippers and imprisoned
leaving Mom and the children alone to face the internment camp.

Everyone was given an identification number to pin on
their shirt and boarded a bus that would take them to a train.The train was slow moving and old and hadn’t
been used in years.Broken gas lamps
hung from the walls and the train was fuelled by a coal burning broiler.Some of the passengers were sick from the
uneven rocking of the train cars.The
compartments were crowded and smelled of puke and sweat making the nausea
people felt even worse.

The train finally stopped in Delta, Utah where the
people were led off the train by armed soldiers and led onto a bus.The bus drove slowly until it reached Topaz
where the passengers saw hundreds of tar-paper barracks sitting beneath the hot
blazing sun.They saw nothing but
telephone poles and barbed wire fencing.As they stepped off the bus they were assaulted by clouds of fine white
dust that choked them, which had once been the bed of an ancient salt
lake.The white glare of the desert was
blinding.

Each new day brought the smells of food: catfish,
horsemeat, beans, Vienna sausage.Inside
the barracks there were iron cots, a potbellied stove and a single bare bulb
that hung down from the ceiling.There
was a table made out of crate wood, an old Zenith radio and no running water
and the toilets were half a block away.

In early autumn farm recruiters arrived to sign up new
workers, and the War Relocation Authority allowed many of the young men and
women to go out and help harvest the crops.Some went to Idaho to top sugar beets, some went to Wyoming to pick
potatoes, some went to Tent City in Provo to pick peaches and pears.Some of the people returned wearing brand new
Florsheim shoes while others came back with the same shoes saying they were shot
at and spat on and would never go back.They reported that there were signs posted all over the town that read:
NO JAPS ALLOWED.

Every week there were new rumors in the camp.They heard that men and women would be put in
separate camps; they would be sterilized; they would be stripped of
citizenship; they’d be taken out on the high seas and shot; they would be taken
to a desert island and left alone to die; they would all be deported to Japan;
and on and on the rumors went.The
people took these assaults on their mental and emotional health in stride.

In mid-October a school was opened in the barracks for
the children.Each morning they had to
sing: “Oh, beautiful for spacious skies” and “My country ‘tis of thee.”

After 3 years and 5 months the war was over and they
were finally home!The house had
changed; paint was peeling from the walls, it smelled, the window frames were
black with dry rot and their furniture was gone, probably stolen.Although many people had lived in their house
during their time away, they had not received one single cheque from the lawyer
who promised to rent their home for them.It was a difficult readjustment for them to suddenly just pick up their
lives where they left off and try to continue on and reintegrate.

When their father finally returned home after more
than 4 years he looked much, much older than his age of 56.His face was lined with wrinkles, his suit
was faded and worn, his head was bare, he moved very slowly and carefully using
a cane.Their father never spoke about
his years in prison and never said what they eventually accused him of –
sabotage? Selling secrets to the enemy?Was he innocent?He was a much
changed man who was suspicious of everyone, even the paperboy.He never returned to work.The company he had worked for before he left
had been liquidated and nobody else would hire him: “he was an old man, his
health was not good, he had just come back from a camp for dangerous enemy
aliens.”

At 144 pages this was an interesting and quick read
and gives a very good picture of a rather embarrassing part of American
history.

As King Hezekiah embraces God’s Law, he leads his
country into renewed prosperity.But
following the will of Yahweh is a perplexing process, requiring unpopular
choices – for both his personal life and political career.Now his archenemy’s demands for tribute are
forcing Hezekiah into a precarious situation.

Jerusha, a young Jewish woman far from home, has seen
firsthand what the dreaded invaders are capable of doing.As the powerful Assyrian army sweeps through
the northern provinces, leaving little but devastation in its wake, Jerusha
longs to escape.Her desperate will to
live could become a link to Jerusalem’s survival.

With Assyria on the march, moving closer to the heart
of Judah, Hezekiah’s decision to follow the everlasting One is about to face
the ultimate test.

My Review:

King Hezekiah is the son of the now deceased King Ahaz
who worshipped the idol Molech and offered his own sons as a sacrifice pushing
them into his fiery mouth to their deaths.Thankfully, Hezekiah had his grandfather Zechariah who taught him that
the One and only God was Yahweh.Yahweh
means “the Lord”.

King Hezekiah ruled Judah from 716 to 687 BC and was
only twenty-five-years-old when he became King.“After King Solomon’s death in 931 BC, the Promised Land split into two
separate kingdoms.Israel, the larger
nation to the north, set up its capital in Samaria and was no longer governed
by a descendant of King David.In the
southern nation of Judah, David’s royal line continued to rule from Jerusalem.”

As the book opens King Hezekiah had walked down the
hill from his palace to the Valley of Hinnom, and followed the path he had
taken the night he was torn from his bed as a child to become a sacrifice to
Molech.It was hard for him to
understand now how anyone could have worshipped the brass idol much less
sacrifice their own child to it.That horrible
night his brothers had been sacrificed instead of him.He remembered his brothers Eliab and Amariah
as he watched the workers destroying it and remembered how his brothers had
burned alive.Although now toppled over,
King Hezekiah knew there were still people who would choose to ignore the truth
about Yahweh and continue to make sacrifices to Molech, only in secret.He instructed Jonadab, his captain of the
palace guards to warn his guards at the Valley Gate to watch the place after
dark when people were most likely to sacrifice their children under the cover
of darkness.He wanted the idol
“…smashed into pieces, melted down and weapons forged from it – swords, spears,
arrowheads, and shields – then fill his armory with them” as he knew someday he
would once again have an army and wanted Jonadab to lead them.He promoted him to “General” Jonadab.

King Hezekiah’s intentions were to turn his people
back to Yahweh and away from all other idols.He enlisted the help of his grandfather, Zechariah, to teach him how to
pray, how to believe, how to love and how to trust totally in body, mind, and
soul in Yahweh.He wanted the people of
Judah to experience all Yahweh’s promises and commands.

His other intention was to stop paying exorbitant
taxes to the Assyrians who were a ruthless and morbidly violent army of
men.Under his father’s reign he had
entered into an agreement of protection from the Assyrians but it was literally
bankrupting Judah.Unsure of his
decision to withhold the tribute to Assyria, he asked Zechariah if he was
making the right decision for the right reasons.Zechariah told King Hezekiah that trusting
God was never a mistake.God commands
you not be afraid, so to be fearful is to doubt God, and that is a sin.Yahweh never promises that life will be
without problems but you are to meditate and pray on what He has promised and
to allow that to be your strength.

Jerusha, is a young Jewish woman who lives with her
mother, Hodesh; father, Jerimoth; and younger sister, Maacah.They are a poor family living on a small
farm.One horrible day the Assyrian’s
storm through their community killing and maiming people in their wake.The evil Iddina grabbed Jerusha and spirited
her away on his horse and she was terrified at having been taken captive by
these barbaric people.Six days after
the raid they reached their camp in the far north.Jerusha was pushed in front of all the other
men by Iddina who was proudly displaying her as his “trophy”.These men seemed more animal than human and
Jerusha was forced to become their prostitute.She was raped over and over by many men and forced to cook for
them.She belonged to all of the men
now.Everything in Jerusha’s new world
was oppressive and evil.She watched as
the men returned to camp with other captives whom they tortured.She listened to the cries of human pain for
death was a sport for the Assyrian’s.It
was a way of life for them and their god.Her life became an unrelenting grind of slavery, preparing meals, and
being used, abused, and raped by Iddina and his fellow officers at night.

Now the Assyrian’s are on the march again and King
Hezekiah is rallying to fortify the walls of his city and rerouting his water
supply but knows the Assyrian’s NEVER lose.Will his faith in Yahweh save his nation?Will Jerusha ever escape or become one of the
many slowly tortured until her death?

I couldn’t put this book down and read it in one
sitting.I was completely entranced by
this story and will be keeping it as part of my permanent collection.I’m really looking forward to reading Book #3
‘The Strength of His Hand.’Pick this
one up, you won’t be disappointed.

Come on peope, PLEASE help me and others to build 5,000 bicycles for African children so they "ride" to school insteading of "walking". It only takes 1 minute per day to build "5" bike parts and there are only "72" days left to participate.

PLEASE, won't YOU help this worthy cause? It doesn't cost you one single cent, only one single minute of your time is necessary and it's fun. Build bikes alone or gather a team and start building and most of all, have FUN!!! I am.

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Gods
and Kings is the story of King Hezekiah, heir to the throne of King David.When his evil father plots to sacrifice him,
Hezekiah's mother, Abijah, searches frantically for a way to save him. But only
two men can help her, and neither of them seems trustworthy.In a time and place engulfed by violence,
treachery, and infidelity to Yahweh, Abijah and her son must discover the one
true Source of strength if they are to save themselves and their country. Book
1 of Chronicles of the Kings.

My
Review:

Gods and Kings is the best Biblical
Historical Fiction novel I’ve read that follows the Bible closely.It’s obvious that Ms. Austin has done her
research well and has an intimate knowledge of the Bible and it comes to life
on the pages before your very eyes.I
was hooked from the first page on.

Bringing
the Old Testament back to life was totally compelling and so well written that
you were transposed into the book as a by-stander watching all the goings
on.In reality, on the one hand, what a
frightening time to have lived in, but on the other hand what an experience the
people of this era had.

Lynn
Austin is an extremely skilled author with the ability to take any story and
make it totally understandable for even the most misguided reader.After reading this first book in the
Chronicles of the Kings Series, it will be much easier for you to turn to your
Bible and read the story again with much greater understanding and
appreciation.The accuracy with which
Ms. Austin writes is truly astounding and makes sometimes difficult reading
easy to understand.

There
are five books in the series and I plan on getting them all. The second book is
titled: “Song of Redemption” and I don’t want to miss a single one!Kudos to you Ms. Austin.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Born in an Andean village in Ecuador, Virginia lives with her
large family in a small earthen-walled dwelling.In her village of indigenas, it is not
uncommon to work in the fields all day, even as a child, or to be called a
longa tonta – stupid Indian – by members of the ruling class or mestizos, or
Spanish descendants.When seven-year-old
Virginia is taken from her village to be a servant to a mestizo couple, she has
no idea what the future holds.

In this poignant novel based on a true story, acclaimed author
Laura Resau has collaborated with Maria Virginia Farinango to recount one girls’
unforgettable journey to self-discovery.Virginia’s story will speak to anyone who has ever struggled to find his
or her place in the world.It will make
you laugh and cry, and ultimately, it will fill you with hope.

My Review:

Seven-year-old, Virginia lives in a small indigenous village in
Ecuador with her mother and father; older sister, Matilde, twelve-years-old; Hermalinda,
her younger sister; and Manuelito, her younger brother.

Virginia is sent away to work as a servant for the people who own
her father’s land.The wife, the “Doctorita”,
a dentist and her teacher husband, Nino Carlos have two boys: Jaimito and
Andrecito.Doctorita is a harsh and
cruel woman often pummelling Virginia with beatings, slaps and punches and
degrading her by calling her names.

Virginia finds her new home is in one large room, with a giant
wooden wardrobe dividing the living room for the bedroom, but Virginia is
forced to sleep on a rug on the floor and she is given one box to put her
clothing in.

This isn’t the first time Virginia’s mother has given her
away.A couple of years prior, she gave
her to an indigenous woman named Marta.Marta wanted a little traveling companion when she sold her wares, so
her mother offered Virginia to her.Virginia had her own bed in that house, it was big, beautiful and fluffy
and she was allowed to watch television something which she hadn’t seen before
and she pealed with laughter at the antics of the cartoon characters.But, it didn’t last, her mother returned the
following morning to take her back home.Virginia was disappointed, not only did she have television, a beautiful
soft bed, but wonderful tasty food to eat instead of her mother’s every morning
potato soup.

Virginia had already realized that the Doctorita and her husband
wouldn’t be treating her as well as Marta had so convinced herself that her
mother would show up and retrieve her from this new horrid place.She wasn’t even allowed to eat off their
dishes and was instead given a gray metal plate, cup, and a dented spoon.

Maria Virginia is told how to do the dishes correctly, right down
to the precise numbers of soap drops she is touse; how to make the beds and how many times to fold the sheet
back.She is told NOT to ever sit on
their bed, not touch the television or stereo except to clean them.She is not to sit on the red chairs or the
sofa, she may not open the drawers in the dressers, she is not to let the
Doctorita’s son, Jaimito touch anything dirty, she must change his diapers
immediately the moment they are wet and she continues laying out rule after
rule after rule.Virginia is sure her
own Mamita will arrive to get her just like the last time – but Mamita does not
come.

Virginia is washing diapers with a washboard but the poop stains
won’t all come out of the material no matter how hard she scrubs so she hangs
them on the line to dry anyway.The
Doctorita comes out screaming at Virginia and begins hitting her in the head
her fists just pound her little head.Pain sears through her but the woman continues to punch and slap until
Virginia’s head is a ball of aching, screaming fire.The Doctorita tells her to wash the diapers
again and if they’re not clean then she will be forced to: “scrub them with
your teeth and eat the caca right off of them!”

This is the true story of a 7-year-old indigenous “child” who was
forced into slavery in Ecuador.Maria
Virginia’s story although heartbreaking, is made utterly compelling in the
capable hands of Laura Resau.Virginia,
from such a young age was forced to find her own way, educate herself, and
learn the ways of the world on her own.Through sheer determination and true grit she emerges into a
well-educated woman with many accomplishments under her belt.For a child of seven to have the strength and
courage that Maria Virginia did to enable herself to suffer through years of
torment and abuse is a testament to her ability to love herself and to want a
better life for herself.

The story was extremely well-written and I was hooked from the
first page and believe a great deal of adults and teenagers will get a lot out
of this story.Very well done!

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Lisa Napoli
was in the grip of a crisis, dissatisfied with her life and her work as a radio
journalist. When a chance encounter with a handsome stranger presented her with
an opportunity to move halfway around the world, Lisa left behind cosmopolitan
Los Angeles for a new adventure in the ancient Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan-said
to be one of the happiest places on earth.

Long isolated from industrialization and just beginning to open its doors to
the modern world, Bhutan is a deeply spiritual place, devoted to environmental
conservation and committed to the happiness of its people-in fact Bhutan
measures its success in Gross National Happiness rather than in GNP. In a
country without a single traffic light, its citizens are believed to be among
the most content in the world. To Lisa, it seemed to be a place that offered
the opposite of her fast-paced life in the United States, where the noisy din
of sound-bite news and cell phones dominate our days, and meaningful
conversation is a rare commodity; where everyone is plugged in digitally, yet
rarely connects with the people around them.

Thousands of miles away from everything and everyone she knows, Lisa creates a
new community for herself. As she helps to start Bhutan's first youth-oriented
radio station, Kuzoo FM, she must come to terms with her conflicting feelings
about the impact of the medium on a country that had been shielded from its
effects. Immersing herself in Bhutan's rapidly changing culture, Lisa realizes
that her own perspective on life is changing as well-and that she is
discovering the sense of purpose and joy that she has been yearning for.In this smart, heartfelt, and beautifully written book, sure to please fans of
transporting travel narratives and personal memoirs alike, Lisa Napoli
discovers that the world is a beautiful and complicated place-and comes to
appreciate her life for the adventure it is.

My
Review:

In
January of 2007, 43-year-old, Lisa Napoli, found herself trekking up a
treacherous mountain in Bhutan to a place called “Takshang” built on a sheer
cliff that soars ten thousand feel into the sky.Lisa is in Bhutan for the summer volunteering
at a radio station called Kuzoo Fm.

The
Bhutanese people are very hearty in many ways.They live off the land as farmers which is a hard life.

Trekking
up the mountain, Lisa is huffing and puffing against the high altitude and the
intensity of the climb.The interesting
thing is that children are brought there from the time they are babies, so you
often see slight and frail seniors navigating the twists and turns and inclines
deftly from memory, in a fraction of the time it takes foreigners half their
age.At the top is a cluster of temples
of which the most sacred of altar rooms is only open to the public once per
year.

It is
believed that meditating for just one minute at Takshang will bring you
exponentially greater blessings than meditating for a month at any other sacred
site.What Takshang promises to all who
visit is cleansing and renewal.

The
Bhutanese follow Buddhism and believe the long revered Guru Rinpoche is the
Second Buddha.Lisa says “this is the
story of my mid-life crises and how I wrestled with and then transcended it...”

Over a
couple of years, Lisa befriended some wonderful people from the Bhutanese
people and returned to Bhutan on three different occasions.

I
found the book to be extremely interesting as very, very little is known about
this closed and secluded country.I
would definitely recommend this book to others who have penchant to learn about
new places that are literally unheard of or where very little is known about
the country and its people.

WELCOME

Welcome to my little part of the web! The Book BagLady (that's me), reviews books for you! I like all types of genres: fiction, non-fiction, literature, women's novels, light romance, memoirs, biographies and autobiographies. The only type of books you won't see me review are: sci-fi; werewolf/vampire type novels; westerns; and heavy romance.
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